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    Can You Spot The Smallest Sculpture Of The Human Form Ever Created?

    It's so tiny that it fits in the head of a needle! Go on, can you see it? Check out this nano sculpture created using physics!

    Lydiarrr
    by Lydiarrr

    Community Contributor

    Where is it?

    jontyhurwitz.com / Via beautifuldecay.com

    Artist, Jonty Hurwitz, has been working with scientists from the Weizmann Institute of Science and Karlsruhe Institute of Technology to create the smallest ever sculpture of the human form. And it’s tiny!

    Oh, there it is...tiny!

    jontyhurwitz.com / Via static.squarespace.com

    Hurwitz and team have been using quantum physics to create these amazing nano sculptures, using ground-breaking 3-D printing technology and a technique called Multiphoton Lithography.

    Look at the nano scale... tiny!

    jontyhurwitz.com / Via static.squarespace.com

    The sculptures are created in a similar way to that which your dentist might use to glue your fillings in! They use a light-sensitive polymer which solidifies when Ultra Violet light is shone on it.

    This one is on a human hair...tiny!

    jontyhurwitz.com / Via static.squarespace.com

    To create these sculptures, the team used a longer wavelength of light and focussed it though a microscope, creating a tiny focal point on the polymer. At this point, the polymer absorbed two photons and solidified, creating a tiny 3D pixel – called a Voxel.

    On the head of an ant...tiny!

    jontyhurwitz.com / Via static.squarespace.com

    They then used a computer to move the sculpture fractionally and add the next Voxel to gradually build the sculpture!

    Just how small is "nano?" In the International System of Units, the prefix "nano" means one-billionth, or 10-9; therefore one nanometer is one-billionth of a meter. It's difficult to imagine just how small that is, so here are some examples:A human hair is about 100,000 nanometers (100 microns) thickThe scale is these sculptures approximately equals the amount your fingernails grow every 5 or 6 hours.
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